


At First

by 64packofcrayons



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Conquest Route, F/M, Mentions of Blood, Mentions of PTSD, Mentions of War, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, References to Depression, awakening spoilers, but laslow deserves love, cameo appearances - Freeform, elise - Freeform, i ship corrin with like 8 people, implied robin/chrom, laslow/corrin is the main ship though, mentions of fe:a characters, nohrian path, possible fates spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-30
Updated: 2016-03-30
Packaged: 2018-05-30 02:19:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6404701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/64packofcrayons/pseuds/64packofcrayons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Laslow realizes that even though Corrin looks like Robin, she is her own woman.</p>
            </blockquote>





	At First

At first glance, he thinks the Princess is Robin.

Laslow stops, and so does his heart. And then he realizes it is not her. The hair is more silver than white, her skin is even paler than the Royal Tactician’s and her eyes, her eyes are larger and shockingly blood red.

He throws himself in front of a Hoshidan blade for her, protecting her as Lord Xander commanded, Peri giggling like a madwoman beside him.

The Princess thanks them, slightly shy but surprisingly graceful and well-mannered for someone who’s been locked away her entire life.

He is not his best that battle, one where Lady Corrin and the very ill Lady Elise barely escape with their lives, one where the Hoshidan King Ryoma, is out for blood.

He wants to approach her, but a mixture of shyness and anger comes over him. _Corrin is not Robin, Robin is not Corrin_. But the sweet, trusting princess just reminds him too much of the person who ripped apart his life.

 

* * *

 

At first, he wants to hate her.

Unfortunately for him, Corrin is a likeable woman. She spars with Effie, reads with Leo and helps to wrangle Avel when he’s on the run again. Corrin indulges Elise’s every request to play, scratches Keaton’s furry ears (although the wolfskin won’t admit that he likes it) and even puts up with antics of Niles.

Selena deposits herself next to him, as he watches Corrin chat up the normally stoic and silent ninja, Kaze. “I know what you’re thinking.” The redheaded mercenary, petulant and angry as always, frowns at the princess.

Laslow turns to her with his trademark brilliant grin. After years philandering in the Nohrian courts, he’s learned to hide his emotions and disarm others with a smile. “What’s that, my dear Selena?”

“She looks exactly like her, doesn’t she?” Selena’s trademark scowl deepens, she glares at the princess so icily, she could plunge the entire country into a twenty-year winter. “It’s unnerving. Do you think – “

“No. Lucina said she was – “

“Keep your voice down,” Selena hisses.

 

* * *

 

 

At first, he wonders if she is Robin reincarnated. Or perhaps she is another future child, a daughter who doesn’t remember her past, like Morgan, someone who could have been but never was.

What would Lucina do? He could never do what Lucina did or would do, she was too smart and cunning for him to even know where to start.

Corrin can be predictable at times. She is trusting, sweet, sees the best in everyone they come across, even those who would gladly slit her throat when the opportunity arose.

Robin was an enigma, flitting from one place to the next and it was always fun to watch, both in the future and past. Unpredictable, never repeated a strategy because after all, lightning never strikes in the same place twice.

 

* * *

 

 

At first, he tries to disarm her, make her slip, reveal something that may hint to her knowing about the Plegian tactician. Laslow accuses of her of flirting with him and asks her to tea (expecting her to decline).

At first the princess is confused, but accepts.

He didn’t think he’d get this far with her, and anxiety washes over him like a wave, knocking him under and holding him under its swell. His lungs seize up, and he realizes this is not his regular bout of shyness.

“Erm…on second thought, I have stuff to do…royal stuff.”

Oh, Gods. Can he pass this off as his normal, day to day routine? Of course, she isn’t the first maiden he’s asked out today, rejection is a normal part of what he does, he’s used to it. Lord Xander probably wouldn’t be too happy to hear about his retainer proposing his little sister, though.

“Ah, there it is. Rejection, my dear old friend.”

The princess’ crimson eyes glint, and Laslow’s heart lodges in his throat. That is a look he has seen before, in a woman who knew her enemy, sized them up and figured out how to bring them down in twenty different ways, all in her head.

“Poor you,” she grins.

He pretends she hasn’t caught him off guard, smiles, laughs, winks. “Life is full of twists and turns and unexpected happenings! We should approach each day as if it were our last, as for all we know it will be! Just think, tomorrow I could be spirited away, for worse!”

_What if you never have an opportunity to see me again? What if? Are you her? Are you the same woman who murdered her own husband and king, who burned the world to the ground? Or are you the one who sacrificed herself and faded away into nothingness?_

“Would you not give anything to then apologize for how you treated me? Perhaps…over a cup of tea?”

Corrin appraises him quickly, and then she pins him with a flat look that she _must_ have learned from Lord Xander, because he freezes. “No.”

_Perhaps you are someone different._

 

* * *

 

And then things change. His own words haunt him and Laslow finds himself keeping an eye on Corrin while in battle, not that she needs it. He knows firsthand how hardy dragons can be. _Nah, tiny Nah with her braids and bright eyes, how she melted boulders with her breath and created hurricanes with her wings._

But he cannot help worrying that Corrin will be spirited away as he had warned her; the Hoshidans come to take her away, she’ll catch the business end of a Wrymslayer.

Odin has every faith in Corrin: “A hero’s blood always pulsates with the burning desire to emerge victorious!”

Selena huffs, gripes about how the princess is _so_ entitled, _so_ naïve. But after a moment, she nudges Laslow’s thigh with her skinny one, mentions how the princess is tougher than she looks, and leaves it at that.

 

* * *

 

 

Corrin is the one who drags him out of harm’s way, her sharp teeth biting into his collar, scratching the back of his neck. The dull sting is masked by the sharp pain in his arm. “You’re okay, Laslow! I’ve got you. You’re safe with me.” Her voice is strangely distorted in her dragon form; like another dragon he knew in another life, one that screamed for blood and murder and death and he needs to _get_ _away from her, get away from me_ –

A tiny, rational part of his brain reminds him that Grima is dead in this lifetime, slain by his own hand. How Corrin is not Robin, but her own person, a pillar of light in the darkness of war. Must he dance around her the way he avoided Robin, or does he dare to get closer?

Slowly, Laslow lets himself relax, lets the princess protect him in her dragon form even as his vision blurs.

Perhaps he can be safe with her.

 

* * *

 

Sometimes he thinks about the others and cries.

His mother would pat his head, smiling softly as was her manner. “ _Oh, Inigo_ ,” she would say, smoothing his hair down and kissing his forehead. _“Oh, Inigo, don’t cry, Mama’s here.”_

In the past, there was a girl there who was Mother and at the same time wasn’t, a timid, shy girl with curls of pink hair spilling down her lithe dancer’s back. He was scared to get close, scared that perhaps the future they came from was set in stone, and Lucina’s mission to change the past and the future would fail.

He thinks about Luci the most. When they said their goodbyes, he remembered how Lucina held her infant self close, whispered, “Yours will be a happy future.” And then he never saw her again.

He hadn’t in been love with her. He had never been in love with anybody, despite what he said and what others thought. He loved her; not in the way that his mother loved his father but like a sister or a close cousin.

Laslow wipes the tears from his eyes, tired all of a sudden. Maybe it was for the best. If she were still around, she would remind him too much of what he had lost.

 

* * *

 

 

He finishes his part of his mother’s dance, the one they had been working on together before she was murdered. Unfortunately, the choreography requires another partner. He considers asking Selena, but knows that she’d have his head on a platter (and Laslow is almost certain that she’d rather being dancing with the Hoshidan ninja, Kaze).

“Laslow?”

The mercenary jumps and whips around, ears burning. Corrin is standing in front of him in her nightclothes, pale as a ghost in the moonlit forest. “L-Lady Corrin!”  
“Laslow, how many times do I have to tell you to just call me Corrin?”

He grins at the familiarity she has afforded him. “I apologize. I am not used to being alone with such a lovely lady of a caliber – “

She gives him a look; not stern but a friendly, playful one that says ‘I’m onto you and your shenanigans that stops him in his tracks. “What are you doing out here? And so late?”

“I couldn’t sleep.”

“Do you always come here when you can’t sleep?”

“Perhaps.”

“Can you not sleep often, Laslow?”

“Perhaps.”

“I’m sorry, am I disturbing you? I didn’t mean to interrupt whatever you were doing.” Corrin looks sheepish, almost like she is ready to leave.

“No, don’t go. I didn’t intend to be rude. I’d like it very much if you’d stay. I’d offer you somewhere to sit, but…” He gestures to the grass, and to his shock, the princess settles down against a tree trunk, stretching her legs out under her.

“So if you don’t mind me asking…what do you do out here? When your thoughts are racing?”

Laslow’s ears burn even redder.

“Why, Laslow, I believe you’re blushing.”  
“I-I am not!”

The princess grins, and he notices, for the first time, that she has dimples. Corrin knocks her bare feet together, tiny and pale and high arched – dancer’s feet, Laslow thinks. He sits down beside her.

“Laslow? Do you like me?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean…well, are we friends? I used to think you didn’t like me,” Corrin mumbles, looking up at him. Her crimson eyes are wide. “Sometimes I still don’t know if you like me. Sometimes I worry that no one does. That this choice I’ve made…hurts more people than I realize.” She sniffs suddenly, laughs. “Oh, Gods. I’m sorry. It’s not fair for me to come and – “

With a thrill of horror, he realizes that she’s crying. _No, not that, anything but that._ “Corrin. Come now, let’s have a smile.”

“I’m supposed to be the leader of this army. I’m supposed to be strong.”

“It’s all right to cry sometimes. I used to cry. A lot.”

“ _You_? But you’re all smiles and laughter. All the time. I can’t imagine you crying.”

Laslow smiles gently at her, brushes a piece of grey hair out of his eyes. The princess pushes at her eyes with her hands one last time, he resists the urge to wipe his thumb over the tears, stop them entirely. “A smile makes everything better, Lady Corrin. And you have a lovely smile.”

 

* * *

 

 

An evening of Peri’s cooking leaves the camp in good spirits, and the mess hall finds itself with a party well after sunset. At first it starts with a keg of beer, brought out on the hulking shoulders of Benny. Then another.

And then someone brings out a fiddle, playing a jaunty tune that soon has the army clapping their hands and stomping their feet.  
Elise is the first out of her seat, laughing as she twirls around and around, ringlets flying out behind her. “Dance with me, Camilla!”

The lilac-haired woman smiles; indulges the littlest Nohrian princess as no one can help but do. She takes her sister’s hands and they are spinning around in a circle, a blur of pink and purple and black.

The tables are pushed to the side, and one by one, everyone is soon up and dancing with another person. Even Selena is approached by Kaze, and she blushes as red as her hair before she takes his hand.

Laslow dances with Felicia first, trying to keep a good natured disposition even after she steps on his feet no less than six times. Effie abandons their dance because she hadn’t finished her third bowl of bean soup. Feeling slightly dejected, he starts to slink back to his spot before he hears his name.

Corrin bounds up to him, her eyes brighter than usual, but her cheerful grin on her pretty face.

_Come now; let’s have a smile!_

“Laslow, will you dance with me?”

His heart soars; did she ask him because she remembered he loves to dance? “Of course I’ll dance with you, Lady Corrin.”

She giggles in delight and he suspects she’s had more than one tankard of beer tonight, but he cannot bring himself to care because she is smiling because of _him_ , he is the person who put that delightful look on her face. Grabbing his hands, she pulls him out into the throng of people.

“You’ll have to lead, because I’ve never danced before.”

Suddenly nervous, he places a hand around her waist, takes the other with his own. Corrin is holding herself away from him, looking down at her bare feet, trying to figure out how to arrange them. “You’ll have to get closer than that, Corrin.” He presses his hand to her back, pulls her closer.

A surprised “Oh!” tumbles from her lips, and he blushes even more, but soldiers on. “On the front of your feet. Like you’re sparring, always ready to move.”  
She does as he says, and she feels lighter in his hands already.

“Just like that. And off we go!”

 

* * *

 

 

Corrin is strong, but she is not invincible. He hears the princess scream, somewhere near his left flank. He spins around, watches a ruffian pull a lance from her torso. “ _CORRIN!”_

She crumples to the ground, whimpering, and he sees red.

He immediately dispatches the outlaw with a slash to the stomach, watches the blood spread over his tunic. Laslow turns around before the man hits the ground, kneeling beside the princess. “Lady Corrin!”

She had been covering his left flank, one he as a tendency to leave open when they spar. Lord Xander had called him out on it many times, but he hadn’t realized Corrin had noticed as well. She had been protecting him.

Like Mother had.

_I cannot watch you die, not like her. I will never forgive myself._

“L-Laslow,” she whimpers, clamps a trembling hand over her wound. Blood spills over her fingers. “I-It hurts.”

“I know, love, I know. Just hang on, I know Felicia is around here somewhere – “ He gently pushes against the wound, covering her hands with his. He looks frantically around for a healer, a horse, anything so he can get her to safety, because that is all that matters because he can’t let her slip away –

“Laslow?”

“Yes, milady?”

“I can use that salve you gave me now.”

He’s confused at first, until he remembers the tin of cream he gave her for minor cuts and burns, smiles softly. Of course she would try to put a smile on his face, even as she bleeds into the dirt. “Yes, you can. We’ll get you all patched up. Now, smile for me, yes? You’re going to be fine.”

Corrin needs thirty-six stitches. He holds her hand the entire time.

 

* * *

 

 

“Lady Corrin!”

  
“Hello, Laslow.”

He finds her in the library, an open tome in her hands. Laslow takes a moment to appreciate the way she offers him a small smile, the way her full lips quirk up a little bit more on the left. The tiny dimple in her cheek makes her even cuter, and he cannot help but ask – “Do you think you could find it in your heart to join me for tea now?”

Corrin’s dimple deepens. “Yes, I think I can.”  

“Dohoho!   Rejected again! Ah, well, another day – er, wait?! You mean you will?!”

Corrin closes the book, takes her time re-shelving it in the appropriate place. She winces as she stretches. The stitches still haven’t healed, and Felicia and Elise wanted to put her on bedrest. Corrin wasn’t having any of it, but many tears on Elise’s part later, she agreed to stay out of the action for three days.

“Yes. We never know when next we meet, do we? And perhaps next time you won’t offer me an invitation.” She looks almost shy, but smiles at him and his heart swells.

That is the day he comes to associate Corrin with the smell of lavender, like the first cup of tea they share together.

 

* * *

 

 

She smells like lavender when they first kiss, not his first kiss but definitely hers. Corrin doesn’t look at him when he lowers his head, placing his hands on her reddening cheeks. Laslow watches her strange, beautiful eyes flick down to his mouth and then finally up to his eyes, and that is when he presses his lips against hers.

He doesn’t linger long, withdrawing quickly like a naughty child caught by his mother with a hand in the cookie jar. Has he overstepped a boundary? Oh Gods, what would Lord Xander do if he found out -  
“Laslow.” Corrin’s voice interrupts his racing thoughts. Her eyes had fluttered closed when he kissed her, and she opened them, almost sleepy and drowsy.

“Yes, my dove?”

“C-Can you - ?”

He kisses her again, nudging her warm mouth gently with his, a little more forceful now that she’s established that she wants _this_ , that she wants _him._ When they part, she rests her cheek against his chest, smelling soft and sweet and something he can’t name, but it’s indescribably her.

After a moment, she looks up at him, grins in that cheeky way that brings out that _adorable_ little dimple and giggles. “You’re blushing.”  
“So are you,” Laslow counters, before dipping his head to kiss her again.

 

* * *

 

 

There had been a moment, he reflects later, where he realized that Corrin was her own woman. Brady had proclaimed him, many years ago, a “ladies’ man”, but this was something he had failed to realize on his mission to make every maiden in the realm swoon at just hearing his name.

Corrin had not been who he thought she was, however there was something he knew from the start. She was someone who gave unconditionally, giving pieces of herself to others to help them rebuild their broken selves.

He isn’t as broken as Lucina, or Gerome or Morgan, he knew that. Sometimes Selena can’t let go of her sword, he has to pry her hands off of it as she trembles and gasps for air. Sometimes he has to calm Odin down, force him to step away from his book of names because he would remember something or someone and hot tears would splatter the ink.

Both the Robins he knew had taken them apart, shattered them until they lay in broken shards at her feet.

He watches as Selena and Odin try to pick up those pieces, put them back together so they vaguely represent who they used to be. He knows they are trying to make it better, trying to find happiness in this world that was not theirs to be happy in, fighting another war that was not theirs, but loving people who would always be theirs. Selena slips her hand into Kaze’s, a small smile gracing her lips, or Odin will press a kiss to Elise’s cheek, rattling off a list of names for her to bestow upon a stave.

Corrin is not Robin, Robin is not Corrin.

Corrin leads him through the dark days, the ones where everything catches up to him. There are days where he is melancholy and does not want to leave his quarters. She will slip in, sit beside him and lean her head against his shoulder. “Do you want to talk?” she will whisper, and sometimes he does, sometimes he doesn’t.

On the days he doesn’t they sit there in silence; knowing the other is there is simply enough.

A moment comes when he realizes that Corrin gives pieces of herself willingly, and worries she will no longer be able to support herself beneath the weight of the choice she’s made.

And then he remembers she relies on him to support her as she does him.

She could never destroy his world, his life, his friends as Grima did. She did not take him apart, as he had feared she would, but picks up the pieces, and quietly shapes them back into a man in love, one who is entirely hers.

 

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> So yeah.  I love Laslow/Inigo, but I don't see a lot of him on here :( I tried to fix that.  And I think he, Selena and Odin hurt a lot more than they let on, so I wanted to explore that a little.  c: 


End file.
